Josiah Concept Ministries

It’s nice to see that some action is being taken on the unfortunate events surrounding Father Thomas Leyland’s forced retirement from St. Rose parish in Perrysburg, OH.  Granted, the action taken falls under the “Too Little, Too Late” tab, but at least the bishop is doing something.

Bishop Leonard Blair has agreed to meet with the folks who have signed a petition requesting Father Leyland keep his pastorate.  The timing of the meeting is pretty interesting: it is the day after Father Leyland loses his pastorate.

How fun is that?  Isn’t this the equivalent of asking the wrecking crew to cease and desist the day after the building comes down?

Also in Roman Catholic news, it looks like the Latin Mass is coming back.  Pope Benedict XVI is expected to issue the official document any day now!  I know I’m on the edge of my seat.

I asuume that everyone is familiar with the Geico commercials that tout Geico’s website as “So easy, even a caveman could do it.”  A church right down the road from the Burger King where I toil to earn a living decided to make a readerboard message that capitialized on the success of that particular insurance ad.  They proclaimed: “Pray.  Even a Caveman Could Do It.”

They wisely changed it the next day.  Did they perhaps realize the plethora of theological problems that it creates?

I’m still back and forth with the 6,000 year old earth versus the 4.6 billion year old earth.  I don’t think that it truly matters how old our planet is–this issue is merely a distraction from the real problem.  Did we evolve, or are we special creations of God?

Obviously, this church’s bulletin board proclaims the evolutionary side of it is true.  Cavemen, after all, aren’t human according to the evolutionary paradigm, but are the (perhaps inevitable) result of millions of years of slow change, descent with modification, over generations and generations.  Our friendly neighborhood church announced that they believe this to be true.

Probably without realizing it.  All the same I’m happy that they changed it.

The new message reads “Smile.  Even a caveman can do it.”  I think that if we all just smiled today instead of blowing up at somebody, then maybe the world would be just a little bit better today.

I haven’t been writing for a very long time due to some Internet connectivity issues.  I don’t like using public terminals, since a good blog entry takes time and research, and public terminals severely limit the time that you can spend.  I hope that the issues will be resolved by Friday, and I will be able to resume the work of this ministry shortly thereafter.

One of the unfortunate side effects of having a hierarchy built into your priesthood is the gross display of politics that comes with it.  Toledo Bishop Leonard Blair has decided to reassign St. Rose parish pastor Thomas Leyland.

Regular readers know that I grew up Catholic, and I attended St. Rose parish in Perrysburg until I fell away from the faith.  I still follow Catholicism, even if only to refute its unbiblical traditions.  Whatever my theological differences with Father Leyland may be, it is painful for me to see an honest man of God be treated this way.

St. Rose was a large parish when I attended, but it has since grown larger.  It is now 8,100 strong.  Father Leyland, pastor since 1999, is loved by all parishioners and well respected in the community.  My mom works at that parish, and has been under four pastors.  She has liked them for the most part, but she appears to have much more respect for Father Leyland.

So why would the Bishop arbitrarily reassign such a well respected man?  Answer: because this well respected man criticized a boneheaded decision.

The Bishop has decided to open a new parish within a few miles of St. Rose.  This has the chance to take half of the membership, and eventually, quite a bit of the students in the school.  Father Leyland spoke out against this move, stating that the new parish is much too close and that no one in the pastorate was consulted when the decision was made.  The Bishop consulted only developers.

Now, the diocese office wishes to reassign Father Leyland, stating that the reassignment is for his benefit and has nothing to do with the criticism.

Yeah, right.

Father Leyland plans to appeal to the Vatican.  I’m going to follow this story and see how it pans out.  I will keep Father Leyland in my prayers.

Oh, and by the way: for you baseball fans, and Detroit Tiger fans in particular, that think the name “Leyland” sounds familiar, yes, Tom Leyland is the brother of Jim Leyland, current manager of the Detroit Tigers.  Leadership runs in the family, apparently.

I will be out of town this weekend to visit my new niece, Allison Lynn, who shares my wife’s middle name.  I love that my family is growing, but I hate that all of the additions seem to live so far away.  Therefore I may not answer my comments or my e-mail in a timely fashion, as I assume that I won’t have Internet access while I’m there.

One last thing: I put my e-mail address on this page for seekers to ask spiritual questions  anonymously.  I want to minister to people, I want to speak God’s truth to all who desire to hear it.  So quit using that link for phishing expeditions.  I will report you.  If your late husband really deposited $2.7 million in a foreign bank account and you absolutely feel led by God to donate the full sum to my ministry because you’re dying of cancer, please use the PayPal links under my “About Us” tab.  Technology is wonderful thing.  It will protect us both–no one has to trade financial information.

I’m sure that PayPal will find a way to broker a transaction of that size for a small piece of it.